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managed only “Ah . . . ,” then nothing. Today that moment would have gone viral on the Web. Mercifully, there were no cameras in the hall.
    For what felt like a week, I stood mute at the lectern. Finally, when the crowd was about out of patience, my friend Peggy Gannon tiptoed on stage and tugged the sleeve of my jacket. It broke the trance.
    I spoke.
    They cheered. Not for what I said but for saying anything. I didn’t care. It felt great.
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    On a hot Fourth of July I knew I would win.
    Angela and I had spent the day climbing hilly streets and walking up front steps to drop off leaflets. Late in the afternoon, wiping the sweat off my glasses, I saw my leading opponent drive by, windows closed, in his air-conditioned car. “Let’s go to dinner,” I said to Angela. “This thing is over.”
    The campaign had its moments.
    There were six candidates. To break out of the pack, one said he’d give $30,000 of his $32,000 salary to local charities. “How is the gentleman going to live?” I asked in a Cleary Square debate. “It sounds to me like this is not going to be his full-time job. I’ll be a full-time councilor!” Not taking that cheap shot would have been political malpractice.
    Another candidate, a retired state police lieutenant, ran on the death penalty. Nothing but death. “Menino, Timilty’s lackey, is against the death penalty,” he declared at one forum. I’d had it with death. I got to my feet. “This is a campaign for City Council,” I said in a sarcastic voice. “When is the last time a city councilor fried anybody? Talk about the real issues.”
    The race drew the attention of the local PBS station, WGBH, which followed me along the campaign trail for weeks. They made a half-hour documentary. I’m not sure if it won any awards but it was definitely a glimpse into neighborhood politics done what some have termed “the Menino way,” one door, one vote at a time.
    In 1983 the only issue was the state of Boston’s neighborhoods. Kevin White, in charge at City Hall since 1968, was the “downtown mayor.” He boasted that Boston was a “world-class city” of skyscrapers, tourist hotels, and harborside concerts. The neighborhoods felt left behind.
    Mayoral candidates identified with White lost in the primary. The two finalists attacked “the downtown interests” and, to my ear, sounded not just pro-neighborhood but anti-development, even anti-business. After sixteen years of Kevin White, “development” versus “the neighborhoods” was good politics, but was it good policy? As city councilor, I promised to bring development
to
the neighborhoods by reviving fading commercial districts, beginning with Roslindale Square, a comeback story told in Chapter 4.
    The district had my name on it. I carried every precinct, winning nearly twice as many votes as my five opponents combined.
    Soon after my election I attended the opening of the new police academy in Hyde Park. The mayor was there to deliver some remarks. He spotted me in the audience. “You want to come up here and say a few words?” I shook my head. “Well, someday you’re going to be up here speaking as mayor,” said Kevin White, then in his last days in office.
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If you run for City Council two bad things can happen to you; one, you lose, two, you win.
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—former congressman Barney Frank
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    I’ll spare you a chronicle of my ten years on the City Council. Instead, I’ll fast-forward and tell how I got to be acting mayor.
    It happened in two stages.
    Stage one: I become chairman of the Ways and Means Committee.
    First, I had to take the committee out of mothballs. For that I needed the help of the new mayor, Raymond Flynn.
    Ray Flynn was one of the greatest athletes ever to come out of Boston. A multisport legend at South Boston High. An All-American basketball player at